Worldwide Wednesday: Reparation Settlement for Native Americans

The largest US indian tribe, the Navajo Nation, negotiated a $554 million settlement from the U.S. government.

“It’s monumental. It will never completely redress the wrongs done to prior generations, but it’s going to allow some opportunities for future generations,” said Dana Bobroff, deputy attorney general for the nation.

LoRenzo Bates, speaker pro tem for the Navajo Nation Council, says that “this is not only a victory for the Navajo Nation in terms of being able to get through this, but it also sends a word out to any Indian country tribes that are in the same situation as the Navajo Nation. There is a solution to what they are having to deal with.”

According to the Department of Justice, the U.S. settled with 41 tribes for about $1 billion in April 2012. Since then, the government has focused on resolving other trust accounting and mismanagement cases. CNN reports this latest settlement “stems from a 2006 lawsuit in which the largest Native American tribe in the US says the U.S. mismanaged trust fund assets dating back to 1946.”